Tag Archives: Dhapa

KOLKATA, (C.M. Paul) – In a rare show of talent, one Chinese MBA final year student and another pursuing BSC Media of a leading business school in Kolkata are set to leave next week (15 April) for internship in China and Germany respectively. Both toppers at the Institute of Leadership Entrepreneurship and Development (iLead) along with a third student are handpicked from their batch for the coveted overseas work experience.

Mr Benjamin Kuo who graduated from St Xavier’s College Calcutta with a first division score in his honors degree is awarded a three month internship programme in Guangdong New Economic Zone in MainlandChina.

His colleague at the B-School Miss Joanna Chang is former student of Loreto College Calcutta and has great passion to travel and explore the world. She will work in Bremen, Germany.

Both are members of Auxilium Parish Kolkata and belong to the Mary Immaculate Chinese Chapel in Dhapa.

“I am looking forward to go toChinaand will make full use of this opportunity, I am confident that this experience will enhance my growth both personally and professionally,” says 24 year old Mr Kuo who belongs to the batch of 2006 from Don Bosco School Park Circus.

“I am grateful to our Director, Mr. Pradip Chopra for believing in my capabilities and giving me this opportunity. I sincerely hope I will live up to his expectation” adds Miss Chang who had her schooling at Grace Ling Liang School Kolkata.

Incidentally, both interns belong to the first batch of students from the i-Lead Institute of Business Management, Kolkata.

“The Chinese community in Kolkata is proud of the achievements of these two enterprising students and wish others too follow their example to venture out into professional and mainstream jobs,” said their former teacher at Scared Heart Chinese School, Weston Street, Kolkata Miss Daisy Mary Kuo.

Today, the Chinese in Kolkata work as tannery-owners, sauce manufacturers, shoe shop owners, beauticians, dry-cleaners and restaurateurs. Among services, teaching and dentistry are traditional occupation.

The first person of Chinese origin to arrive in Calcutta was Yang Tai Chow who arrived in 1778. He worked in a sugar mill with the eventual goal of saving enough monies to start a tea trade.

Many of the earliest immigrants worked on the Kidderpore docks. A police report in 1788 mentions a sizeable Chinese population settled in the vicinity of Bow Bazaar Street.

Kolkata is the only city in India to have a Chinatown, the only other Chinatown to exist in Mumbai has practically disappeared.

It is estimated that the Chinese population in Kolkata number less than 2,000.